“It is the only thing of your history which I do not yet understand. Unless it is truly idlegossip.”
She withdraws her hands.
“You mean George Garrison, I presume?”
The boy who drowned. Who the good wives of Trescott mourned.
“Yes.”
“Must you really know of my every humiliation?”
It is a strange way to describe a drowning. But I have learned that with Annabelle, so much is not what it seems.
“I will not insist that you tell me. I do not want to know what you would rather not share. I do not want intimacy by force.”
“And would you write to please me? Even if I refused?”
I smile. She is exhausting, truly—unrelenting. But I have learned her by now. I know if you fight her, you will only push her further from you. If you are gentle, however, she often comes just a bit closer.
“I think you know, Annabelle, that I would do anything that you wanted. If my writing something will delight you, I will do it. I would obey any request from you if that is what you needed.”
She bites her lip as if considering. And then she huffs out a breath.
“If I am to tell you about George Garrison, then I must tell you about Terrence French.”
That name was also mentioned by the Trescott good wives. But that tale paled in comparison to that of George Garrison.
“I will listen to anything you will tell me.”
“Very well,” she sighs, looking away from me. “Since you want to think the worst of me.”
“I do not,” I say, taking her hand. “I only want to know you.”
“Well, know me you shall. At your own peril. I told you about Frank—and how things ended.”
I nod. “And he lives only by your grace.”
She gives a little, half-hearted laugh.
“After Frank, I was desperate. I wanted to show myself that I had not cared for him. And I wanted to defy my father. At first, there was no one else I could stomach bedding—and my standard was not high. Months passed. And something strange happened. I began to transform. Physically. When I was with Frank, I was awkward. My skin spotted and my figure too round.”
That Annabelle could have been awkward I very much doubt. I refuse to believe that she was ever anything less than beautiful. But I don’t interrupt her, not wanting to stem the flow of her story.
“But in the months afterwards, in some perverse twist, I became much more comely. Beautiful, even. If my father despaired of getting anything from me on the marriage mart before, he was grieved doubly now. For it became evident hecouldhave gotten something for me, just as I had revealed that my virtue was forfeit.”
“Did he tell you such a thing?”
“Not precisely. But it was evident. He began to ask me to appear at dinner in fine dress. He would say it was practice for my debut. It was a form of punishment. We both knew that I would never make a debut. That I was doomed to live in his house at his mercy. Well, I refused such a fate. I was not sure how I would escape yet. But I knew I would.”
My heart constricts at this description. Her fatherwantedto humiliate her.
“What a bastard.”
“He was. And he pushed me to abandon reason altogether. I know I cannot blame him for myactions?—”
“You can,” I interrupt. “You were a child.”
“Only just.” She sighs. “Terrence was the son of the local solicitor. He had been away at school, but then he came back. When we met in town I knew I had found what I was looking for. He began to ply me with attention—gifts, compliments—but I knew what he wanted. And I didn’t care. I started meeting him in the woods. With Frank, I was so sweet on him…and he was gentler. It wasn’t like that with Terrence.”
